
Glass _ 

Book 1 



c 



PALLIATIVE AND PREJUDICED JUDGMENTS CONDEMNED 



A. DISCOURSE 



Di-:i.i\ i:ui:i> in 



THE FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH, 

/ :■-, 
RICHMOND, VA., JUNE 1, 1865, 



The Day appointed by the President of iKe United States for Humiliation 
and Mourning on Account of the Assassination of President lAncoln, 



TOGETHER WITH 



AN EXTRACT PROM A SERMOM, 



Preached on Sunday, April 2-)rd, 1865, upon the Assassination of President 

Lincoln. 



BY J. LANSING BUEEOWS, 1>. D. 



RICHMOND, VA.: 
OFFICE COMMERCIAL BULLETIN 

1805. 



PALLIATIVE AN I ) PRE.) I' ! > I C K I > J U I >G M BNTS CON D HMNED. 



A. DISCOURSE 

Delivered in the First Baptist Church, Richmond, Va., June I. i860, th 
Day appointed by the President of tin- United States, for " Humiliation 
and Mourning'' on Account of the Assassination of President Lincoln 



BY J. L. BURROWS, D. D. 



He that justitieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the jusl, even they both are tm 
abomination to the Lord. — Prov, xvii, 15. 

Essential and eternal are the distinctions between right and wrong 
No change of circumstances, no considerations of policy or expediency, 
can transmute sin into holiness, or obedience into transgression. 
Whatever is in itself wrong, is always wrong; whatever is in itself 
right, is forever right. Men often call good evil, and evil good. God 
abhors this confounding of antagonistic elements, and " he that 
justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both 
are an abomination to the Lord. 7 * 

Prom motives of interest or expediency men often justify the wicked 
and their crimes. Excuses and apologies arc often made for deeds 
which in their own true character are condemned by every enlight- 
ened conscience and by the law of God. Falsehood and fraud and 
robbery and murder are palliated and justified by men whose selfish 
purposes or passions are gratified by their perpetration. Vices and 
crimes, odious in themselves and injurious to society, are justified 
under the plea of necessity or policy. The infamous proverb, " the 
end sanctifies the means," is, in substance, often repeated and practi- 
cally illustrated. Many smooth over the deformed features of wicked 
acts by euphemisms. In the language of the day, fraud is called shrewd- 
ness — blasphemy, free speech — falsehood, invention — perjury, equivo- 
cation, and robbery, appropriation. 

The blackest crimes of the horrible war through which we have 
j ust passed, have found and yet find justification from some who claim 
to be personally upright and even pious. Bobbery and arson and 
massacre and rape; cruelty to prisoners and faithlessness to solemn 
oaths; the spoiling of unarmed citizens and defenceless women; the 
wanton destruction of household goods and agricultural implements, 
of growing crops and stored grain ; the whole black cataloguo of out- 
rages perpetrated by maddened armies, which authority and discipline 
are often too weak to restrain, and which are condemned alike by the 
law of nations and the law of God — we sometimes hear palliated and 
defended. This is to justify tho wicked, and by whomsoever and on 
whatever side such justification is an abomination to God, 



This extenuation of wickedness is hateful to God : 1st. Because it 
confounds the distinctions between holiness and sin. 2d. Because it 
assumes another law than His will for the government of human con- 
duct. 3d. Because it debases and depraves thejnoral sense. 4th. 
Because it demoralizes and inflicts incalulable mischiefs upon society. 
God hates this justifying of wickedness, and how can we speak 
lightly, laughingly or apologetically of that which is so strongly 
antagonistic to the whole scope and spirit of His Holy law ! 

We are called upon to-day, by the President of the United States, 
to assemble in our churches, and give expression to our condemnation 
and grief, for the terrible- crime "which has shocked the nation, and 
hurled the chief of a great people from his high position by an assassin 
blow. We respond to the invitation, join the nation in its mourning, 
record our detestation of the crime, and our sympathy with those 
who suffer. We have no feelings but those of horror and indignation 
and grief in contemplating this deed of infamy. 

Whatever may have been the personal character of President Lin- 
coln, whatever may have been our views of the political doctrines and 
policy he represented, we have but one voice and one heart, of pro- 
found and abhorrent condemnation of the brutal criminality of those, 
whoever they may be, who are directly or remotely implicated in the 
atrocious deed. And this I am glad to know, for the honor of 
humanity and Christianity, is the universal voice of the people of this 
City and State. 

it is obviously not becoming in us to press forward as special 
eulogists of Mr. Lincoln. Those who know him personally may more 
appropriately speak of his virtues and excellencies. We of the South 
have known him mainly as the representative man, whose name and 
position embodied the political principles that were involved in the 
war. To these principles we have been arrayed in known antagonism 
during the last four years. We might, therefore, be well chargeable 
with hypocrisy, for which we should be scorned by all honest men, 
with base truckling for present favor, if, against all the views and sen- 
timents we have so plainly and energetically expressed, wo should- 
now suddenly in the spirit of sj^cophancy and slavishness, pretend to 
admire and approve the policy and aims of which the late President 
was the representative. 

We accept the settlement of these fc principles by the arbitration of 
war and by the providence of God ; we submit to the government 
which has been established, as the " powers that be that are ordained 
of God;'-' we mean to be what we have sworn to be, faithful and loyal 
subjects of that government, to maintain and uphold its authority and 
influence ; we may even believe that, under the providence and sover- 
eignty of God, the best results, from the wdiole struggle for the whole 
country, all things considered, have been attained — that it may prove 
best that the system of slavery should end, and, like the Mosaic Dis- 
pensation, and the grand useful old feudal system, give place to further 
developments of progressive civilzation ; wo may even accept a cen- 
tralized nationality, as swallowing up the claims of State sovercigiHy ; 
and yet accepting and believing all this, modesty and consistency might 
well forbid that we should thrust ourselves into prominence as the 
eulogists and admirers of the late President. We were honest in our 
views and in our action during the fearful struggle; we thought we 
were right when we sympathized with and aided our State and sec- 
tion. And we cannot ypeld all manliness, and self-respect, and consis- 



tency, and conscience, by pretending an approval and admiration of 
doctrines and policy to which we have been honestly" opposed. 

But that we should justify his assassination, or express or feel any 

emotion but horror and detestation and grief for such a crime that 

be far from us Christians and honest men. 

"VVe may further lament on our own account the sudden death of 
Mr. Lincoln. We have reason to do so. We believe he was disposed 
to be generous and liberal in his measures for the reconstruction of 
the government. No harsh or vengeful or malignant thoughts toward 
our people seemed to find place in his heart, in arranging for the set- 
tlement of the great controversy, lie would, I doubt not, as leniently 
and benevolently as possible, have exerted his great influence and 
authority. His death is, therefore, a calamit}^ to us for which Ave 
mourn. 

Far fropi justifying it, then, we condemn and mourn it, as a crime 
in itself— as a calamity to the nation — as a special misfortune and 
wrong toward ourselves. 

Inscrutable are the providences of God ! fathomless to human ken 
are His purposes ! But Jehovah reigns. He has permitted this crime 
to be committed. His wisdom and might will overrule it to the fur- 
therance of His own beneficient designs, in the progress and well- 
being of humanity, in the enlargement and purity of that kingdom of 
Jesus for which the world itself exists, and in the glory of His own 
reign and name. 

May God comfort those who are stricken most nearly and severely 
by this blow, and afford to them the consolations and guidance of His 
grace. 

II. To condemn the just or the innocent is equally an abomination 
to the Lord. 

To treat as criminal one who asserts his innocence, and against 
whom no crime has been proven, under the impulses of prejudice or 
passion or fanaticism ; to condemn and punish such as though they 
were confessed and convicted offenders, is a crime against humanity 
and a sin against God. Indeed, there may seem something benevolent 
and humane in the reluctance with which kind-hearted men admit the 
guilt and censure the offences of the erring. It is a vice that " leans 
to virtue's side." It may have its foundation in a " charity that 
thinketh no evil." It' may be a generous unwillingness to believe in 
the utter and entire depravity of the human soul. A weakness it may 
be, a sin it may become; but it is a weakness and sin inclining toward 
benevolence^ 

But condemning the innocent is a vice that bears toward malignity. . 
It evinces a readiness, an eagerness, to believe evil concerning another. 
It has its origin in evil surmisings, suspicions, jealousies and cruelty. 
It is ready to believe the worst; to look upon the blackest side of 
human conduct. Its basis is a malevolent spirit, and, therefore, (fod 
abhors it. It hounded the martyrs to the dungeon, the scaffold and 
the stake. It dragged the Son of God to Calvary, and murdered him 
there. 

In relation to the lamentable event which this day has been appointed 
to commemorate and to mourn, we have a sad illustration of this 
spirit. Notwithstanding their most earnest and indignant protest, 
notwithstanding asseverations the most solemn of their innocence of 
counselling, countenancing, or approving this black crime, the people 
of these Southern States, as :i whole, are pertinaciously and fiercely 



6 < 

condemned and denounced as responsible and guilty of the vile deed. 
That a fierce and infuriate soldiery, that a fuming and conscienceless 
political press, should, in the hot wrath of the hour, turbulently utter 
such wholesale charges, is not wonderful nor unusual. With these we 
have nothing to sav, on this solemn day, and in this consecrated house, 
for it is not here four province to speak of the military or political 
aspects of such questions. But, that the so-called religious press, that 
the sermons of professed ministers of Christ's gospel of truth and love, 
theoretically supposed to cherish some measure of the temper of 
Christian charity and truthfulness; to evince, at least, some remote 
imitations of the spirit of Christ, should emulate and exaggerate the 
violence and virulence of military bulletins and political phillippics — 
this is a dishonor to religion, a stain upon the Christianity of this 
century. Against the palpable injustice and wrong of such baseless 
denunciations, it is the right, it is the duty, of Christian ministers and 
churches to protest in the name of Jesus and Christianity. 

A few extracts from these misnamed religious papers are necessary 
in order to show, that we are guilty of no unfairness or exaggeration 
in charging them with that unjust condemnation which is an abomina- 
tion to the Lord. PP~~ ~IP| 

The Examiner and Chronicle, of New T Yoric, April 20th, says : " The 
President of the Eepublic has fallen, the selected victim of rebel assas- 
sination, solely because he has been the Eepublic's most dauntless 
champion, and most watchful guardian. Whatever may be said to the 
contrary, men will everywhere believe, that this foul and fiendish con- 
spiracy, in which two vulgar assassins have been the actors, is the 
result of rebel machinations at a distance. In strking him down, by 
their representative assassin, they have destroyed their chief hope of 
a lenient and indulgent pacification. They may exult in the damning 
deed, but, by his death, they will surely have to bear the retribution of 
a justice, which, had he lived, might have been tempered with a greater 
mercy. 

"The crime of the miscreant murderer now seems to stand forth as 
the type of the whole rebellion, and in the agony of our calamity it 
appears like a mockery of justice to hunt down his worthless life, and 
leave unpunished the traitors of whose plottings he was one of the 
humblest executors." 

The same paper, of May 4th, thus discourses: "Assassination was 
organized into a regular plot, and a band of authorized agents was 
formed for its accomplishment. It has always been encouraged by 
leading secessionists and sanctioned by public opinion in the rebel 
States. And now the stain of the long intended deed will rest upon 
them forever. It was prompted by their inspiration and was perpe- 
trated in their service, and however earnestly or severely it maj' - now 
be repudiated or condemned, it by no means follows that it would not 
have been accepted and approved, had it been in season to do them 
anything but unspeakable harm. In its dark and dire atrocity the 
world will see reflected only the real spirit of this rebellion. It has 
betrayed itself at last to the dismay and confusion of all its sympa- 
thizers and applaudcrs in ever} r land." 

The Independent, of April 27th, says : " The vial of retributive wrath 
is too large and full to bo squandered upon the single head of a trem- 
bling wretch who now skulks from the eye of the world. Let the 
great punishment fall upon the first, the cbief, the arch criminal in this 
crime of crimes. The murderer of the President is slavery." "Let 



the American people when they have buried the corpse which they 
now watch, arise from their sackcloth and ashes, to target amnesty 
and to execute judgment." 

A correspondent of the same paper— a woman, too, says : " From the 
first moment I heard of the murder I believed the plan was known 
and approved at Richmond, if not concocted there. Meanness and 
brute violence are the natural outgrowth of shivery. .Men educated 
under such a system become familiar with assassination." Jefferson 
Davis is called the "the prompter in the tragedy of the assassi- 
nation." 

The Watchman and Reflector, of Boston, thus discourses: " Ihc bar- 
barism of slavery has culminated in an atrocious crime, and the nation 
is thrilled with horror. It was fitting that an institution of the dark 
a<'cs, should select the method of the dark ages, for doing its ac- 
cursed work. To the black catalogue of its sins in treason, and 
theft, and perjury, and murder, and starvation of prisoners, is now 
added the assassination of the President." 

The Christian Era, of the same city, May 11th, says: 
"If it (The Missionary Union) shall now hasten to invite back the 
•niiity clergy of the South, who, from the beginniug, have had murder and 
treason in their hearts, it may fear that it will be swept away before the 
indignation of an aroused and vigilant people." 

But I will not weary you with further quotations of this character. 
What do they mean? If anything, they mean that the Southern peo- 
ple, as a body, are responsible for" the murder of President Lincoln, 
and should be, without mercy, punished for it. They mean that you 
and I, my brethren, should be stigmatized and abhorred as assassins. 
Without a tittle of evidence; against our solemn pleas of "Not Guilty," 
we are condemned and judged as murderers. If the text from which 
I preach is inspired truth, then the spirit that develops itself in such 
charges " is an abomination to the Lord." To His righteous judgment 
Ave commit the retribution. 

" Slavery murdered President Lincoln !" And yet not a slave- 
holder is shown to have had the slightest participation in the 
crime. 

" The Confederacy assassinated the President !" And yet with 
one insignificant exception, not a man ever connected with the Con- 
federate°army or Government, is shown to have had any knowledge 
of the plot. No resident of any Confederate State has even becn^ 
brouo-ht to trial on suspicion of complicity with this crime. Even if 
there 5 were slaveholders, or Confederate soldiers or officials, proven to 
to have participated in, or connived at this bloody deed, it would be 
unjust to confound the innocent with the guilty. How much more so 
when the most vigilant scrutiny can not detect a man or woman who 
ever had a home in a Southern State, to summon before the tribunal 
of justice and answer to the charge. 

Would it not be equally logical and just to say," Because these detected 
assassins lived in Washington or Maryland, therefore, we hold the people 
of Washington and Maryland responsible forthecrime: Because some of 
them were connected with the theatre, therefore we regard all actors as 
involved in the guilt of murder: Because most of them are in the com- 
munion of the Roman Catholic church, therefore we hold that church, 
with its Bishops and Cardinals and Pope, responsible for the assassi- 
nation. The doctrines and policy of Popery train and arm assassins. 
Honest and thinking men would be shocked at such astoundi'ng in- 



ferences from the facts. And yet they are as fair and logical as the 
deductions which these ministers of the gospel, these guides of the 
religious sentiments of the people, these expositors of ethics and guai-- 
dians of the morals of the churches, have flung out in their patriotic 
phrenzy against the people of the South. 

I would not transcend the limits of allowed liberty of speech, I would 
not^awaken emotions that are inconsistent with the solemnities of the 
day, but surely it may bo permitted us, while we lament the calamity 
that has bowed a nation in mourning, to repel the charge uttered from 
man}' a religious paper and pulpit, that we are involved in the guilt 
that has wrought this calamity and awakened this mourning. 

And now, my brethren, in concluding this discourse, let me exhort 
you to guard your spirits against the indulgence of malign emotions, 
and your conversation against bitter and irrascible words. A modest, 
earnustand firm defence against charges which impeach 3*0111- integrity 
and conscientiousness, is required of you by self-respect and truth." But 
to return railing for railing, to cherish a contentious or malevolent 
spirit, is useless, mischievous, an offence to God, and destructive of the 
sweet and peaceful spirit of piety. What seems to you so unlovely, 
so repugnant to the temper of the gospel, so contrary to the meek and 
forbearing spirit of Jesus, in others, do not allow yourself to copy. It 
would be as hateful in 3-ou as it is in those whoso unjustly and malev- 
olently condemn and denounce you. Oh! my brethren, it is hard to 
bear injustice meekly, to endure unfounded and unreasonable reproaches, 
humbly and unresistingly, and yet this is the spirit of which our Lord 
set us a glorious example, and which lie requires of His disciples : "I 
say unto you resist not evil." " Overcome evil with good." 

It is with us a little matter to be judged with man's judgment. The 
very acts and principles for which we are censured and villified b} r men, 
may be approved and justified by God. What are called so flippantly 
l-ebellion and treason against human governments, may be stigmatized 
as "the worst of crimes" by statesmen and politicians, whose standard 
of judging is simply political; but God's decisions of right and wrong- 
arc measured by no such standards. He adjudges guilt or innocence- 
according to the sanctions of that moral law, the complete summary 
of which He has given us in the Ten Commandments, and in which 
mere political offences are not included. These do not involve the 
guilt for which the soul is condemned at His tribunal. Among the 
noblest and purest men, morally, the world has ever seen, have been 
many who have been denounced, condemned and executed for treason 
and rebellion, and 3 r et from the scaffold their pure spirits, justified 
through the righteousness of Christ, have ascended to receive the 
smiling approval and blessing of their infinite Judge and Father. Onl}' 
let us maintain our integrity in His sight, seek purity of heart and the 
self-acquittal of our own consciences, through the purifying blood of 
Christ's atonement, w 7 alk obediently along the path of His command- 
ments, and the censure and wrath of men can work us but little and 
but temporary harm. Let us be faithful in our duties as citizens, and 
pious in our spirit as Christians, seeking in all our relations to our fel- 
low men, " the things that make for peace, and things whereby one 
may edify another," and we may hope for the dawn of that htfppy day, 
when "the envy also of Ephraim shall depart, and the adversaries of 
Judah shad be cut off. Ephraim shall not envy Judab, and Judah 
shall not vex Ephraim. And there shall be a highway for the remnant 
of the people, which shall be left like as it was to [srael in the day 
when he came up out of the land of Egypt." 



LXTPAOT F110M A SEBMOH 

PREACHED AX 

THE FXJRST BAPTIST CHURCH, 

Sunday, April 23rd, 1865, • 

Upon the Assassination of Abraham Lincoln, IWsiJcnt of the United States 
[From the Richmond Times.] 



The text on the occasion was taken from the 2jth chapter of Job, 
portion of the 22d verse : " No man is sure of life." 

The exordium.consisted in a dissertation 'upon the uncertainty of life, 
and from these "general reflections, the orator proceeded to remark 
that : . , 

We have found a most melancholy and startling illustration in the 
terrible event which, since last Ave met, has shocked and. -thrilled the 
hearts' of the people of this country: the horrible and execrable 
assassination of the President of the United States. If any man, 
because of high position and influence; because of uncompleted plans 
and purposes," upon which the interests and destinies' of a great nation 
were suspended; because of the hopes and yearnings of millions of 
people that were turned in agony of solicitude toward his decisions 
and measures; might seem, for a season, assured of continued life, 
under the guardianship ot a watchful Providence, that man would 
seem to our wisdom to have been Abraham Lincoln. No weightier or 
more momentous political interests were ever concentrated in one 
man's life since this world began than were concentrated in his life, 
The North were listening for his counsels with confidence, and the 
South with glimmerings of hope. Anticipations of the termination of 
a war as disastrous and bloody as any which ever cursed our globe, 
began to be indulged. And, just at this point of suspense and expec- 
tation, Death thrust his skeleton form upon the scene, and for the time 
all seems whirled back into chaos and night. * :;: * * * 
The method of President Lincoln's death excites our horror and 
indignation. It was an atrocious and brutal assassination, for which 
there can be not only no excuse, but no possible palliation, unless t he- 
perpetrator were an irresponsible lunatic. Only a desperate villain 
could premeditate such a crime, and only reckless depravity could 
approve or justify it, The slaughter by armed men of each other on 
the battle-field is a spectacle, saddening enough to the Christian heart, 
which only a stern necessity can at all justify, and which it is very 
difficult to reconcile with the spirit of the gospel. War, in its most 
allowable phases, is of doubtful morality, a still lingering relic of de- 
praved barbarism. Yet the soldier*' Amy in some sense be regarded as 
an official of the government, like the constable or sheriff, acting under 
the authority of law. But when, without law, without the authority 
of government, from motives of private vengeance or avarice, or by 
constituting himself an avenger of what he may deem public wroDgs, 



1(1 

one slays an unarmed foe, ho becomes simply a vulgar and execrable 
assassin, who should be hunted down withput mercy, and executed by the 
officers of the law without pity. I ana glad to feel that I speak the sen- 
timents of the Southern people, when I characterize this crime in 
terms of unmeasured abhorrence and disgust. With whatever other 
crimes the citizens of the Southern States may be chargeable, none 
can assert with truth that private, skulking assassination is encouraged 
or excused by the popular sentiment or spirit. Even the miscalled 
" laws of honor/' which permit a man to meet in mortal conflict a 
personal foe — and which is, in itself, a barbarism, for which there 
should be in this day no apologists nor defenders — even this savage 
code denounces as a criminal and a coward, the man who takes an 
unfair advantage, and seeks the life of an adversary, without an equal 
and open exposure of his own life. There is no intelligent or cultivated 
Southern man, there is no good or generous heart anywhere, that does 
not regard with burning indignation and scorn, a professional crime like 
this. There is no sympathy with the cowardly bravo, who carries a 
concealed stiletto, and lies in wait for his unarmed and unconscious 
victim. 

And if the assassination of the humblest citizen is thus to be regarded 
with horror and detestation, how much more when the Chief Magis- 
trate of a great nation is recklessly slaughtered. It may be true that 
his life is no more precious to himself than that of the lowliest. But 
both by the laws of our nature, and by the requirements of Clod's 
word, there is demanded for the rulers of a people a respect and ven- 
eration which men in private stations may not claim. Their lives are 
more sacred, because they belong not merel}- to themselves, but to the 
nation. The murder of one in such a position is, therefore, a far 
blacker crime than ordinary homicide. It is an assault upon the 
honor and dignity of a nation. It is a blow which strikes the hearts 
of millions. It is an outrage upon the rights, and interests, and affec- 
tions of a whole people. Committed by a subject of the government, 
of which the victim is the representative and head, as in this case, it 
associates with it all that is foul in treason with all that is base and 
revolting in murder. Ho is, therefore, no common criminal whose 
hands have perpetrated this bloody deed. When David, after suffering 
great personal wrong, found Saul, his King, in his power, he dared not 
avenge himself, but in the spirit of allegiance and piety, exclaimed: 
" The Lord forbid that I should stretch forth my hand against the 
Lord's anointed I" 

It has been said that the South should be held responsible for the 
assassination of President Lincoln, and that severer measures should 
be adopted toward the people because of this crime. This would be 
visiting upon the innocent the sins of the guilty. This would be, in 
its turn, an injustice and a crime. To hold a whole people responsible 
for an outrage which they not only disown, but deplore and abhor, 
might be the first impulse of blind and phrenzied passion, but cannot 
become a principle of action with fair-minded and magnanimous men. 
Let the guilty suffer. Let those who were accessory to a deed so infer- 
nal, either in its conception or execution, meet the just penalty of the 
law, but in the name of justice, and fairness, and humanity, let not 
maddened passion seek for victims among those who are as guiltless 
of such a crime as the closest personal friends of the murdered Presi- 
dent. In the name of the South, I protest, with all the earnestness of 
which my nature is capable, against being involved in the remotest 



11 

degree in an atrocity from which bay whole soul revolts, and which 
can awaken no utterance of more honest and indignant condemnation 
in any section of the country than in these Southern States. 

In the present aspect of political affairs, the bitterest enemy of the 
South could not have devised a deeper injury, a direr mischief to the 
people than the 7nurder of President Lincoln. The malignity of a 
demon could not have concocted a more effective scheme for damaging 
the South than this. Just at the point of time when our principal 
army had surrendered ; when organized resistance was hero no longer 
possible ; when a polic}-' of conciliation looking to a general amnesty 
and a resumption of peaceful relations was announced as the purpose 
of the President of the United States, as if deliberately intended to 
thwart this benevolent policy; to overthrow these plans of peace; to 
kindle into a fiercer flame the embers of suspicion and jealousy, and 
rancor, this assassin hurls his blood}* dagger between the approaching 
parties, that they may recoil in horror from their mutual advances. 
If the deed was a calamity to the North, it was a more harmful ca- 
lamity to the South. It could prove no possible benefit, and might 
prove a most direful mischief. Thus not only morally, but politically, 
it was (i stupendous crime ((gainst the South. In this aspect of the case, 
we have even more reason^to mourn over this murder than the people 
of the North. Its tendencies are to inflict a deeper injury upon us 
than even upon them. May God in His providences overrule these 
reactionary tendencies, arcd, despite this diabolical ingenuity, carry 
forward His own gracious purposes of mercy and peace. 

If this murderer of President Lincoln had ever been identified in 
any way with our Government or armies ; if he had been even a citi- 
zen of any Southern State, there might have been a little more show 
of reason in charging the South with sympathy or participation in the 
crime. Even in such a case it would be unjest to hold the many ac- 
countable for the outrage of a few ; to associate the innocent with the 
guilty in indiscriminate hostility and violence. In eveiy community 
there are desperate and brutal men, for whose villainies none but them- 
selves can righteously be held responsible. But the perpetrator of this 
nefarious deed was a citizen of a State never in formal political union 
with the Confederacy of the South. Following his disreputable and 
immoral calling as an actor, he is said to have been in Richmond when 
the war commenced, and to have fled from it when the probability 
arose that military service might be required of him, and has never 
been connected in any way with the Southern government or army. 
!l' connected, as asserted, with a clique known as the "Knights of the 
Golden Circle," this is affirmed to bo an association which originated 
in the North, and numbered but few adherents in the Southern Stair-. 
Living an immoral ami degraded man in the city of Unit i more, associated 
with revelling drunkards and harlots, and play actors, utterly out "(the 
pale of respectable society, without the knowledge or sympathy, or co-opera- 
tion, so far as it appears, of any Southern official, soldier or gentleman, la , 
either alone or in alliance with a feu- loretches of the same low class, pro- 
jected this deed of cruel infamy. The facts, so far as developed, warrant 
no other theory than this. 

And for the acts of such a man, with such associates as he could 
influence, shall the people of ten States, or an}* one State, be held ac- 
countable ? Shall the policy of a great nation be influenced by the 
eccentric or extraordinary crime of one man, who must be either an 
irresponsible madman, a vaporing knave, or an arrant font? or by the 



12 

outrages of a secret band of such men plotting in midnight cabal, like 
vulgar outlaws and robbers, their deeds of violence and crime ? A 
strong nation will hunt them down and extirpate them, as shepherds 
do the wolves that break into their folds. But shepherds do not ureal; 
their vengeance upon the scattered and ivorried flocks, from suspicion that 
they may liave been in league with the wolves and encouraged 'or participated 
in their ravaqe ! 

The reverend doctor explained that he ventured to speak thus fully 
and earnestly upon this theme, because he deemed it fitting that some 
voice from the South should be heard in its name, manfully repudiat- 
ing any sympathy with, or approval of, such a crime as has shocked 
the world, and earnestly protesting against being held responsible, in 
any degree, for outrages which every good and honest man must 
mourn and detest. 



